JavaScript Date Objects

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JavaScript Date Objects let us work with dates:

Year: Month: Day: Hours: Minutes: Seconds:

Examples

const d = new Date();

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const d = new Date("2022-03-25");

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Note

Date objects are static. The "clock" is not "running".

The computer clock is ticking, date objects are not.

JavaScript Date Output

By default, JavaScript will use the browser's time zone and display a date as a full text string:

You will learn much more about how to display dates, later in this tutorial.

Creating Date Objects

Date objects are created with the new Date() constructor.

There are 9 ways to create a new date object:

new Date()
new Date(date string)

new Date(year,month)
new Date(year,month,day)
new Date(year,month,day,hours)
new Date(year,month,day,hours,minutes)
new Date(year,month,day,hours,minutes,seconds)
new Date(year,month,day,hours,minutes,seconds,ms)

new Date(milliseconds)

JavaScript new Date()

new Date() creates a date object with the current date and time:

Example

const d = new Date();

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new Date(date string)

new Date(date string) creates a date object from a date string:

Examples

const d = new Date("October 13, 2014 11:13:00");

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const d = new Date("2022-03-25");

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Date string formats are described in the next chapter.

new Date(year, month, ...)

new Date(year, month, ...) creates a date object with a specified date and time.

7 numbers specify year, month, day, hour, minute, second, and millisecond (in that order):

Example

const d = new Date(2018, 11, 24, 10, 33, 30, 0);

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Note

JavaScript counts months from 0 to 11:

January = 0.

December = 11.

Specifying a month higher than 11, will not result in an error but add the overflow to the next year:

Specifying:

const d = new Date(2018, 15, 24, 10, 33, 30);

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Is the same as:

const d = new Date(2019, 3, 24, 10, 33, 30);

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Specifying a day higher than max, will not result in an error but add the overflow to the next month:

Specifying:

const d = new Date(2018, 5, 35, 10, 33, 30);

Is the same as:

const d = new Date(2018, 6, 5, 10, 33, 30);

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Using 6, 4, 3, or 2 Numbers

6 numbers specify year, month, day, hour, minute, second:

Example

const d = new Date(2018, 11, 24, 10, 33, 30);

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5 numbers specify year, month, day, hour, and minute:

Example

const d = new Date(2018, 11, 24, 10, 33);

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4 numbers specify year, month, day, and hour:

Example

const d = new Date(2018, 11, 24, 10);

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3 numbers specify year, month, and day:

Example

const d = new Date(2018, 11, 24);

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2 numbers specify year and month:

Example

const d = new Date(2018, 11);

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You cannot omit month. If you supply only one parameter it will be treated as milliseconds.

Example

const d = new Date(2018);

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Previous Century

One and two digit years will be interpreted as 19xx:

Example

const d = new Date(99, 11, 24);

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Example

const d = new Date(9, 11, 24);

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JavaScript Stores Dates as Milliseconds

JavaScript stores dates as number of milliseconds since January 01, 1970.

Zero time is January 01, 1970 00:00:00 UTC.

One day (24 hours) is 86 400 000 milliseconds.

Now the time is: milliseconds past January 01, 1970

new Date(milliseconds)

new Date(milliseconds) creates a new date object as milliseconds plus zero time:

Examples

01 January 1970 plus 100 000 000 000 milliseconds is:

const d = new Date(100000000000);

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January 01 1970 minus 100 000 000 000 milliseconds is:

const d = new Date(-100000000000);

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January 01 1970 plus 24 hours is:

const d = new Date(24 * 60 * 60 * 1000);
// or
const d = new Date(86400000);

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01 January 1970 plus 0 milliseconds is:

const d = new Date(0);

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Date Methods

When a date object is created, a number of methods allow you to operate on it.

Date methods allow you to get and set the year, month, day, hour, minute, second, and millisecond of date objects, using either local time or UTC (universal, or GMT) time.

Date methods and time zones are covered in the next chapters.

Displaying Dates

JavaScript will (by default) output dates using the toString() method. This is a string representation of the date, including the time zone. The format is specified in the ECMAScript specification: